taylor nicholson?

“I’m about to hit a flow state with these readings, see you all in an hour or two,” I announced loudly to my roommates late last night before I hunkered down in my bedroom to research for my graduate studies class. Despite my roommates knowing nothing about Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and the real psychological evidence behind flow, they all knew exactly what I was talking about and wished me good luck with my assignments, telling me to “lock in” so I could join them in watching a movie afterward. Walking towards my awaiting laptop and pile of books, I couldn’t help but wonder about the meaning of flow and flow states in our current year, especially with Gen Z and Gen Alpha.

Before reading about Csikszentmihalyi’s research into flow, I used to think that flow state was just another overused Gen Z buzzword, like ‘delulu’, ‘bed rotting’ and ‘larping’. My friends and I would throw it around for everything: when we’re on a winning streak in a video game, when we’re trying to focus on driving to the mall, if we’re multitasking between math homework and reading our history textbook, and so on. The amount of times I’ve said “I’m entering flow state right now” has caused it to loose all meaning to me, dismissing all the research that has gone into this fascinating example of positive psychology. This all changed when I started doing my own deeper research into flow, which made me realize its a lot deeper than I once thought.

An article by The Guardian introduced me to the locus coeruleus, or “blue spot”, which is where Prof Dimitri van der Linden claims flow takes place in the brain. Seeing that flow went further than just another piece of slang to use made me realize I couldn’t remember the last time I hit a true flow state. Sure, I’ve been focused before, and have found myself losing track of time while doing a task, but none of these recent instances have ever come close to a true flow state. I have experienced all the elements of flow states on their own, but they had yet to combine into a perfect storm of true flow. This realization ate away at me, and made me feel like I have been doing something wrong for years: that I’ve been intentionally missing out on the bliss of flow. However, I realized that it wasn’t my own incompetence impeding with flow, but the technology I rely on.

Student researcher Navya Pothamsetty from UC Berkeley explains the difficulties of cultivating flow in the digital era, since technology has been shown to distract people out of a potential flow state. She also shared tips on how to facilitate flow in the workspace, especially in one dictated by text documents, constant emails, and limitless distractions from our work-assigned laptops. She also mentioned “micro-flow”, which acts as a precursor to full flow. A micro-flow has some of the aspects of a full flow state, but is shorter and is only a partial manifestation of flow.

Since my current life is surrounded by technology and other distractions, hearing about micro-flow and strategies to cultivate flow amidst a technology driven life felt reassuring to me. It made me feel like I haven’t been damned from ever reaching flow again, and that not all hope was lost. As I mentioned in my last post, everything is about baby-steps and slowly working away from my technology clouded life. So, if the next small step towards regaining my focus (and in some aspects, my life back) from technology and distractions, then I will welcome the micro-flow before the true flow any day.